Attacks Leave Many With Trips Not Taken

It may be months before the U.S. travel industry and its insurers have settled accounts with travelers whose trips have been disrupted in the past two weeks. But if you’re wondering what to do about an upcoming trip that was planned before Sept. 11, many travel companies have drafted new guidelines for bookings and rebookings, and the changes have rippled far beyond the airline industry to cruise lines, hotels, tour operators and companies that offer trip cancellation and interruption insurance.

One general road rule: Expect more flexibility from airlines and hotels than from cruise companies or tour operators, which have more money at stake with each customer.

Whether you’re newly travel-wary or ready to resume old habits, those new policies might make the difference between a minor inconvenience and a debt of several thousand dollars.

Many companies have largely returned to their pre-catastrophe practices, a move that could leave many trip-shy customers paying thousands for trips not taken. Most cruise lines require 100% payment in advance and typically require customers (or their insurers) to forfeit it if they cancel. After Sept. 17, most major cruise lines reverted to that policy, said Kern Lucas, co-owner of Concierge Cruises, an agency in Tucson, Ariz.

Los Angeles-based Crystal Cruises preserved its Sept. 18 sailing of the Crystal Harmony, a 10-day itinerary from New York to Montreal, by moving its embarkation point to Baltimore. The company absorbed the cost of changing passenger air itineraries from New York to Baltimore but decided to stick with its usual no-refund policy, said spokeswoman Mimi Weisband.

For Carl Pascal, 85, of Covina, who decided to cancel after the crashes, that may mean forfeiting $12,000.

“They’ve asked me to write them a letter [seeking special consideration], but I don’t have a positive sense,” said Pascal’s son, Patrick, who called the line on behalf of his father. Patrick Pascal said that because his father theoretically could have gotten to Baltimore for embarkation in time, neither his trip insurance company (he bought insurance through his travel agent) nor Crystal seems inclined to excuse his absence.

Shortly before the cruise departed for Montreal, Weisband said that more than 800 passengers were expected to be on board; the ship’s capacity is 940.

Weisband said the company would consider individuals’ requests, but, like other major players in the cruise industry, its goal was to return to normal policies as soon as possible.

Other companies are giving travelers more latitude than usual, but it’s a delicate balancing act. American Airlines, for instance, is waiving its usual change fee for customers who want to rebook trips that were scheduled to begin between now and Nov. 15. If you booked that trip through an online agency, such as Travelocity, the airline may require you to deal with the booking agency.

With government and airline officials working on a plan for federal assistance to the airlines, some consumer advocates expect similar flexibility throughout the airline industry.

“If people are afraid to fly between now and Thanksgiving, I think the airlines are going to work with them [on refunds or rebookings],” said Terry Trippler, airline expert for the travel Web site Onetravel.com. “The airlines are going to have to, if they want any money from Congress. There’s no way they’re going to be able to be tough with people and then have Congress give them money.”

Officials at Hilton hotels and resorts said they would ease their cancellation policies for individual guests through the end of September and ease those policies for group events such as weddings and banquets through the end of October. Similarly, at Hyatt resorts in the Caribbean, the hotel company is “canceling reservations upon request and waiving cancellation fees for individual guests until further notice,” spokeswoman Kim Greiner said last week.

Tour operators, which typically have cancellation policies as rigorous as those of cruise lines, have taken varied approaches to the issue.

Butterfield & Robinson, a Toronto-based operator of luxury biking and walking trips, has received a flurry of cancellations on upcoming Turkey and Egypt trips, said spokeswoman Cari Gray. The company is offering customers the option of switching to another tour in 2001, at no added cost, or switching to a 2002 tour, with 50% credit. But Gray said the company would not offer full or partial cash refunds.

At Backroads, a Berkeley-based tour operator that specializes in upscale biking itineraries, nearly 600 travelers were due to begin trips on Sept. 15 and 16. Of that number, 70% changed their plans, mostly because they could not fly to trip starting points in the U.S. and abroad. (The company offered a choice of refunds or credit toward a future trip.)

For the next three weeks, said spokeswoman Julie Snyder, about 5% of the company’s clients (who prepaid for their travel) have canceled. Those travelers can receive 75% of their deposits back in the form of credit toward future travel. Ordinarily, the company allows no refund for those who cancel within 14 days of departure, a 15% refund to those who cancel 15 to 29 days before departure, and 35% for those who cancel 30 to 44 days ahead.

If you have booked a hotel, cruise or tour through a travel agent, the agent should be able to tell you the company’s practice. (If you’re a particularly good customer, the agent might even be able to pull strings for you.) But neither agents nor consumers can assume anything: To manage in unprecedented circumstances, businesses are making up a lot as they go along.

Travel insurance companies were a great hope for many travelers whose plans have been scrubbed, but six days after the crashes, just as the Travel section was going to press, those companies had yet to answer key questions, including this one: Were those plane crashes legally definable as acts of war?

If so, thousands of travelers might be unprotected. At CSA Travel Protection, a San Diego-based company that sells about 800,000 policies a year to travelers, chief marketing officer Claudia Fullerton noted that travel insurance policies exclude coverage for “declared or undeclared war or any act of war.” (Many travel cancellation/interruption policies specifically cover “terrorist incidents” abroad but do not mention terrorist incidents in the U.S.)

Policy language varies from state to state and company to company, but the issue is a crucial question throughout the industry. “We haven’t figured that out,” Fullerton said Monday. But, she added, “I know we’re going to be paying a lot of claims, and rightfully so.”

For travelers with complaints about travel providers, there are places to complain. A few general rules usually yield the best results:

Write a detailed account of your problem as soon as possible after the problem has occurred. Quickly say exactly what you want. (If it’s compensation, say how much.)

Begin with your travel agent, if you used one. Next, write to the company with which you have an issue and keep a copy of your letter and any replies. If the response is unsatisfactory, consider contacting one of the organizations listed below:

* Travel Consumer Restitution Corp.: This quasi-public agency reimburses California consumers who don’t get services they paid for from California-based travel sellers. For claim forms, contact the organization at P.O. Box 6001, Larkspur, CA 94977-6001; fax (415) 927-7698. No public phone, Web site or e-mail is available, but there’s a fuller explanation on the Internet at https://www.gocalif.ca.gov/agents/seller.html. (Another site with an excellent list of consumer resources is https://www.hasbrouck.org/links/index.html.)

* California attorney general: To check on the registration of a travel seller or register a complaint, contact the office at 300 S. Spring St., Los Angeles, CA 90013; telephone (213) 897-8065, fax (213) 897-2801.

For broader questions about companies that do business in California, contact the attorney general’s Public Inquiry Unit, P.O. Box 944255, Sacramento, CA 94244-2550; tel. (800) 952-5225, fax (916) 323-5341, https://www.caag.state.ca.us/consumers/mailform.htm.

* American Society of Travel Agents: This trade group takes complaints about its member companies. Contact ASTA’s Consumer Affairs Department, 1101 King St., Suite 200, Alexandria, VA 22314; tel. (703) 739-8739, fax (703) 684-8319, https://www.astanet.com.

* U.S. Tour Operators Assn.: Another trade group that tracks complaints about its members. Contact USTOA at 342 Madison Ave., Suite 1522, New York, NY 10173; tel. (212) 599-6599, fax (212) 599-6744, https://www.ustoa.com.

Better Business Bureau: Regarding businesses in Los Angeles, Orange, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, call (909) 825-7280, fax (909) 825-6246 or go to https://www .bbbsouthland.org. In Ventura, Santa Barbara and San Luis Obispo counties, call (805) 963-8657, fax (805) 962-8557 or go to https://www.santabarbara.bbb.org.

U.S. Department of Transportation: This agency takes travelers’ complaints, mostly about airlines. Contact DOT, C-75, Room 4107, Washington, DC 20590; tel. (202) 366-2220, https://www.dot.gov/airconsumer/problems.htm.

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Christopher Reynolds welcomes suggestions, but he cannot respond to letters and telephone calls. Address comments to Travel Insider, Los Angeles Times, 202 W. 1st St., Los Angeles, CA 90012; e-mail chris.reynolds@latimes.com.